World Families Forums - New Bell Beaker papers

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.. noticed on the Standard of Ur (circa 2500 BC) that the Sumerian king and six of his homeboys were drinking from something reminiscent of Bell Beakers.

No - those appear to be either horn or stemmed cups, the narrow stem of which could be held in one hand. Stemmed pottery goblets are much easier to make on a wheel and so appear in the Near East after the potter's wheel. Nothing to do with Bell Beaker.

Well, nothing to do with blackish cups made of coiled clay by women in Portugal. I was focusing more on its being a 4,500 year old picture of seven elite guys drinking what looks like a toast, out of something with a "bell" silhouette at the top. Could be about to do a libation of bull's blood, for all I know, but it's a neat picture to have.

Also, I can easily hold a large flat-bottomed beaker in one hand, and in fact I often do.

The wrist guards would be more compatible with the Irish bronze age rapier type sward for parrying thrusts than against the short thick slashing swards. I don't know if the timescale is compatible. There are round small shields of both Scandinavian and Mediterranean type in Ireland.

Not really period compatible. Rapiers are a little later than the beaker copper daggers and the shields are quite a lot later in the Bronze Age.

The wrist guards would be more compatible with the Irish bronze age rapier type sward for parrying thrusts than against the short thick slashing swards. I don't know if the timescale is compatible. There are round small shields of both Scandinavian and Mediterranean type in Ireland.

Not really period compatible. Rapiers are a little later than the beaker copper daggers and the shields are quite a lot later in the Bronze Age.

Not to mention the numerous arrowheads in Beaker graves which indicate the wrist guards were intended to protect the inner forearm from the bowstring.

One thing about the wrist guards is that the two-holed version were common in the west, while the four-holed ones were from east. Both types were found in the British Isles. However, I don't know if one preceeded ther other or just regional developments. It's just another indication that there were two main variations of Beaker culture.

One thing about the wrist guards is that the two-holed version were common in the west, while the four-holed ones were from east. Both types were found in the British Isles. However, I don't know if one preceeded ther other or just regional developments. It's just another indication that there were two main variations of Beaker culture.

My understanding is that Atlantic France was where the two streams (Iberian and Rhine/west-central European) met. I am not sure about the current thinking on the relative chronology of the two streams reaching Atlantic France. I think roughly speaking the Loire was the boundary where Iberian influences pettered out and northern ones took over. However, I was taught this a long time ago so it may not still stand.

One thing about the wrist guards is that the two-holed version were common in the west, while the four-holed ones were from east. Both types were found in the British Isles. However, I don't know if one preceeded ther other or just regional developments. It's just another indication that there were two main variations of Beaker culture.

My understanding is that Atlantic France was where the two streams (Iberian and Rhine/west-central European) met. I am not sure about the current thinking on the relative chronology of the two streams reaching Atlantic France. I think roughly speaking the Loire was the boundary where Iberian influences pettered out and northern ones took over. However, I was taught this a long time ago so it may not still stand.

Alan,When I lived in France, the country, for climate and other purposes was divided into North of the Loire and South of the Loire. The South always got the good weather. I have always looked at the Loire as being the superhighway linking the Atlantic (L21) Celts to the Contintental (U152) Celts. It was also an important hub between the Iberian Celts and the Isles. This hub position also extended to Megalithic cultures. The Loire was also the home of the Canuts and the Centre of the Celtic Druidic tradition on the continent.

Could be about to do a libation of bull's blood, for all I know, but it's a neat picture to have.

It is a lovely picture to have. That sums up a problem. Because so many things were first depicted in Mesopotamia (because that is where agricultural surplus was paying artists and craftsmen), it has been assumed over and over again that everything so depicted was actually invented in Mesopotamia. Wheeled vehicles - also shown on the Standard of Sumer - are one example. I talk about this: http://www.buildinghistory.org/distantpast/widerview.shtml

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Since writing began in the cities of Mesopotamia and art was also advanced there, the first indisputable image or written record of an innovation often appears there. Many innovations were therefore credited to Mesopotamia which now seem to belong rather to the hilly flanks of the Fertile Crescent, the Eurasian steppe or even further afield. Pottery appeared in the Far East and Africa long before it was made in the Near East. Pottery reached Europe first from the steppe. Agriculture began along the great curve of the Taurus and Zagros Mountains. Metal-working too began in the hills that provided the ore. Gold was first worked in the Balkans. Horses were domesticated on the steppe and donkeys in North Africa. Wheeled vehicles were probably first made in the European steppe/forest zone. Light spoke-wheel chariots appeared first on the West Asian steppe. Wine was first produced on the southern slopes of the Caucasus, where grapes grew wild. Dairy farming, as opposed to herding cows primarily for meat (with occasional milking), first appeared around the Sea of Marmara - on both the European and Anatolian coasts. Wool sheep may have been first bred in the Caucasus, where the earliest surviving woollen textile has been discovered.

Volker Heyd, Growth and expansion; social, economic and ideological structures in the European Chalcolithic, from the new book that I mentioned in April, is now in the Mini-Library. I think it is one of the best of the bunch in outlining the whole Bell Beaker story.

Volker Heyd, Growth and expansion; social, economic and ideological structures in the European Chalcolithic, from the new book that I mentioned in April, is now in the Mini-Library. I think it is one of the best of the bunch in outlining the whole Bell Beaker story.

Volker Heyd, Growth and expansion; social, economic and ideological structures in the European Chalcolithic, from the new book that I mentioned in April, is now in the Mini-Library. I think it is one of the best of the bunch in outlining the whole Bell Beaker story.

He follows typical archaeological tradition in being vague on migration on the whole (as opposed to mobility) and is actively hostile to it in places such as where he treats Corded Ware as a hostile native reaction to Yamanya. Heyd is always a good read but I think he would be surprised if he was thought of as a strong plank in migration theories. He tends to talk about interaction, networks, social change etc which is indeed the norm in archaeology in recent decades for right or wrong. However I have got to honest and say that a lot of his papers describe widespread social changes in a non-migratory way and that actually is often more believable. I think for example his list of selective Yamnaya influences across Europe in his previous paper if it was interpreted as migration evidence would set the evidence bar so low (ground level really) that its meaningless.At that level of evidence then you could argue migrations all over the place throughout prehistory. I think a lot of what he writes has an anti-migration wording (very anthro).

I think you misunderstand Heyd's phraseology on page 104. He talks clearly enough about the origin of the spread of the Secondary Products Revolution in the interaction between the herders of the Pontic steppe belt and their advanced sedentary neighbours.

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The third stage, immediately preceding the Beaker Phenomenon, is signalled by the infiltration of the Yamnaya population from the Pontic steppe into areas of south-east Europe in the early 3rd millennium, bringing with them a distinct package of innovations. Next we see neighbouring societies responding to this package. This is seen as the beginning of a Late Copper Age. The deepest social transformation occurs however north of the Carpathians. Here societies gradually react against groups of Yamnaya people migrating up the rivers Prut, Dnestr, and Dnepr. The result is the emergence of a distinctive new lifestyle, economy, settlement and social organisation, called the Corded Ware Complex...

"react against" does not necessarily imply hostility. In this context that would make no sense. The new lifestyle etc is actually spread by the incomers. He is phrasing things tactfully certainly, to allow for a local input into this new society, as has been the traditional view.

By the way a new paper revises the traditional date for the start of CW to 2750 BC, rather than the 2900 BC given by Heyd.

By the way, don't get me wrong, I have always loved big picture social archaeology such as heyd and I rarely have found anything I disagree with. However in migration terms beyond the east of Europe he does not exactly go out of his way to distinguish interaction and migration or the balance of both. I don't blame him though because it's probably archaeology's (without the white coat backup) weakest suite. I actually don't think lack of discussion by archaeologists on all but the most obvious migrations was often not actually ideological but just a recognition of the difficulty in inferring it and also not wanting egg on thir faces if they get it wrong, archaeologists being very cadgey and non committal as a result.

I think you misunderstand Heyd's phraseology on page 104. He talks clearly enough about the origin of the spread of the Secondary Products Revolution in the interaction between the herders of the Pontic steppe belt and their advanced sedentary neighbours.

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The third stage, immediately preceding the Beaker Phenomenon, is signalled by the infiltration of the Yamnaya population from the Pontic steppe into areas of south-east Europe in the early 3rd millennium, bringing with them a distinct package of innovations. Next we see neighbouring societies responding to this package. This is seen as the beginning of a Late Copper Age. The deepest social transformation occurs however north of the Carpathians. Here societies gradually react against groups of Yamnaya people migrating up the rivers Prut, Dnestr, and Dnepr. The result is the emergence of a distinctive new lifestyle, economy, settlement and social organisation, called the Corded Ware Complex...

"react against" does not necessarily imply hostility. In this context that would make no sense. The new lifestyle etc is actually spread by the incomers. He is phrasing things tactfully certainly, to allow for a local input into this new society, as has been the traditional view.

By the way a new paper revises the traditional date for the start of CW to 2750 BC, rather than the 2900 BC given by Heyd.

So how is the Corded ware connected to the steppes given that it sprang up "north of the carpathians".

So how is the Corded ware connected to the steppes given that it sprang up "north of the carpathians".

As Heyd says, people from the steppe moved up rivers east of the Carpathians: the Prut, Dnestr, and Dnepr. This is not news. The caginess that Alan mentions is simply over the degree to which the obvious flow of ideas, objects and technology reflects migration. That is a question best approached by genetics. Archaeologists can interpret the material remains in different ways. Some might point to the change of burial custom between the Neolithic/TRB and CW as pretty convincing evidence of a different people arriving. Others might want to argue continuity of certain features from the TRB as evidence that local people were just adopting new fashions.

The continuity approach has been traditional for decades, but at least one of its props has been removed by ancient DNA. (The idea the the TRB was local. In fact it came from the Balkans). What we really need now is ancient Y-DNA from the TRB, to compare with that from CW.

This is an old (1984) but very interesting paper from Alfred Czarnetzki: The genetic Influence of Bell Beaker people in Bohemia: http://tinyurl.com/7yfdt3t

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A somewahat oversimplified summary of the following would suggest that during the bell beaker period the majority of Bohemian immigrants were males, obviously bearing a different gene pool. This new intercourse between the immigrants and the indigenous neolithic Bohemians result in a gene flow with a corresponding shift in the gene pool. The examined sample population from the Aunjetitz period admittedly contained a considerable number of hereditary factors from the original population, yet had been sufficiently altered by the gene flow to permit reconstruction of its directionality. Whether the bell beaker people subsequently emigrated or not does not emerge from any material investigated.

lt is hoped that this paper has brought some additional insight into the possibilities epigenetic traits analysis can open up when interpreting and reconstructing the processes las well as their inherent directionality) involved in population differentiation - as well as the importance of clear determination of sex.

Background to Beakers is the result of an inspiring session at the yearly conference of European Association of Archaeologists in The Hague in September 2010. The conference brought together thirteen speakers on the subject Beakers in Transition. Together we explored the background to the Bell beaker complex in different regions, departing from the idea that migration is not the comprehensive solution to the adoption of bell Beakers. Therefore we asked the participants to discuss how in their region Beakers were incorporated in existing cultural complexes, as one of the manners to understand the processes of innovation that were undoubtedly part of the Beaker complex.

In this book eight of the speakers have contributed papers, resulting in a diverse and interesting approach to Beakers. We can see how scholars in Scandinavia, the Low Countries, Poland, Switzerland, France, Morocco even, struggle with the same problems, but have different solutions everywhere. The book reads as an inspiration for new approaches and for a discussion of cultural backgrounds in stead of searching for the oldest Beaker. The authors are all established scholars in the field of Bronze Age research.

These are the abstracts of some papers of the book: http://tinyurl.com/cpj3ll4Some papers seem really very interesting with new ideas: A critical review of the Dutch model, the Bell Beaker navigators, the origin of the Bell Beaker phenomenon based on the cultural communication between the Northwest Africa and Estramadura, ...I have ordered it.

Background to Beakers is the result of an inspiring session at the yearly conference of European Association of Archaeologists in The Hague in September 2010. The conference brought together thirteen speakers on the subject Beakers in Transition. Together we explored the background to the Bell beaker complex in different regions, departing from the idea that migration is not the comprehensive solution to the adoption of bell Beakers. Therefore we asked the participants to discuss how in their region Beakers were incorporated in existing cultural complexes, as one of the manners to understand the processes of innovation that were undoubtedly part of the Beaker complex.

In this book eight of the speakers have contributed papers, resulting in a diverse and interesting approach to Beakers. We can see how scholars in Scandinavia, the Low Countries, Poland, Switzerland, France, Morocco even, struggle with the same problems, but have different solutions everywhere. The book reads as an inspiration for new approaches and for a discussion of cultural backgrounds in stead of searching for the oldest Beaker. The authors are all established scholars in the field of Bronze Age research.

These are the abstracts of some papers of the book: http://tinyurl.com/cpj3ll4Some papers seem really very interesting with new ideas: A critical review of the Dutch model, the Bell Beaker navigators, the origin of the Bell Beaker phenomenon based on the cultural communication between the Northwest Africa and Estramadura, ...I have ordered it.

Background to Beakers is the result of an inspiring session at the yearly conference of European Association of Archaeologists in The Hague in September 2010. The conference brought together thirteen speakers on the subject Beakers in Transition. Together we explored the background to the Bell beaker complex in different regions, departing from the idea that migration is not the comprehensive solution to the adoption of bell Beakers. Therefore we asked the participants to discuss how in their region Beakers were incorporated in existing cultural complexes, as one of the manners to understand the processes of innovation that were undoubtedly part of the Beaker complex.

In this book eight of the speakers have contributed papers, resulting in a diverse and interesting approach to Beakers. We can see how scholars in Scandinavia, the Low Countries, Poland, Switzerland, France, Morocco even, struggle with the same problems, but have different solutions everywhere. The book reads as an inspiration for new approaches and for a discussion of cultural backgrounds in stead of searching for the oldest Beaker. The authors are all established scholars in the field of Bronze Age research.

These are the abstracts of some papers of the book: http://tinyurl.com/cpj3ll4Some papers seem really very interesting with new ideas: A critical review of the Dutch model, the Bell Beaker navigators, the origin of the Bell Beaker phenomenon based on the cultural communication between the Northwest Africa and Estramadura, ...I have ordered it.

I am a bit dissapointed with the book because its basically a compilation of stuff that has all already appeared in papers. It does bring stuff together in a single book but there is not much new there if you have been reading the latest papers.

I am a bit dissapointed with the book because its basically a compilation of stuff that has all already appeared in papers. It does bring stuff together in a single book but there is not much new there if you have been reading the latest papers.

I don't think Chapter 3 has been in other papers, including the maritime-heavy works of Cunliffe. Most of it is new to me, anyway, and I've been looking for this stuff. Also Lemercier's voice is heard here in English, for people who haven't checked out his recent work published in French.

Be that as it may, the conference was in 2010; it takes a while for these academic things to get collected, revised, out to "readers" and back, and published. Meanwhile there are indeed other papers to read -- some in very preliminary form. It's all good; it's just not all equally good, or equally timely. In a couple of years we can read what you and Jean and a few other serious people think about it, on reflection. At the moment, to me it looks like pretty good stuff.

I am a bit dissapointed with the book because its basically a compilation of stuff that has all already appeared in papers. It does bring stuff together in a single book but there is not much new there if you have been reading the latest papers.

I don't think Chapter 3 has been in other papers, including the maritime-heavy works of Cunliffe. Most of it is new to me, anyway, and I've been looking for this stuff. Also Lemercier's voice is heard here in English, for people who haven't checked out his recent work published in French.

Be that as it may, the conference was in 2010; it takes a while for these academic things to get collected, revised, out to "readers" and back, and published. Meanwhile there are indeed other papers to read -- some in very preliminary form. It's all good; it's just not all equally good, or equally timely. In a couple of years we can read what you and Jean and a few other serious people think about it, on reflection. At the moment, to me it looks like pretty good stuff.

It is good stuff. I am probably being a bit humbug. I would have loved it if I hadnt been rooting about for papers on this stuff over the last year or two. Problem is just my own that I have read the stuff mainly already. Doesnt make it not great. Just spoiled it for myself really! Still at least its a lot easier to access this. There is a whole lot more good thinking going on in beaker studies recently. Actually one slight further dissapointment on this is simply that there are not more chapters and more regional analysis for more countries.